From the new patch onward I've been having a problem wherein I start the game:
- Acces the main menu
- Press "Continue"
- And then in the Animus loading screen the game freezez up, and doesn't load
It does not go to a "Not responding" status in the task manager either, it just stays frozen up like that.
I've left it going for an hour now and it still doesn't do anything.
Hello there @sh*tpickl3! Welcome to the forums 
I'm sorry to hear that you're encountering freezing issues when launching Assassin's Creed: Valhalla. Thanks for sharing your report with us.
If you haven't already, please can you try these PC troubleshooting steps? In particular, please try disabling any background applications, as these could be conflicting with the game files.
If the issue continues to persist after trying these steps, please don't hesitate to update us.
Thanks! 
Thanks for letting us know that you've tried the troubleshooting steps, @sh*tpickl3. I'm sorry to hear that the issue still persists.
To help us to investigate further, it would be helpful to view your system files. I recommend that you open a support ticket so our team can take a closer look at these. When opening a support ticket, please include a copy of your MSinfo and DxDiag. Additionally, please ensure that you include all of the troubleshooting steps you have tried already in your case notes, as this will be helpful as the team takes a closer look at what could potentially causing this issue to occur.
If you have any trouble opening up a support ticket, please don't hesitate to reach out to us.
Thanks! 
Hi @tedblackbear and welcome to the forums.
I'm sorry to hear that you are also experiencing a freezing issue whilst playing Assassin's Creed Valhalla.
Can you please go through the PC troubleshooting steps in the support article here if you haven't already done so then try again.
However if the issue persists, could you please submit a support ticket and attach your system files, dxdiag and msinfo and our Customer Support team will investigate this further for you.
@tedblackbear Thanks for the update, I'm pleased to hear that the issue was resolved by closing those processes that you mentioned.
I am unsure why those processes would cause the game to freeze.
Hello @haikara12 and welcome to Discussions!
Happy to hear that the workaround provided by @TedBlackBear helped to solve your issue.
VoiceControlEngine is MSI utility. It is not essential for the Windows OS and causes relatively few problems. VoiceControlEngine.exe is located in a subfolder of "C:\Program Files (x86)"—normally C:\Program Files (x86)\MSI\One Dragon Center\VoiceControl\ by default, but could be different for you if you installed Windows on a different partition.
Please let us know if you have any other questions.
devtrackers.gg